"Let's talk about vanilla"

Or we can talk about ducks. Texans will understand.

I must confess, I hardly ever use vanilla extract. There, I said it.

99 times out of 100 I will use vanilla beans. I know, you are thinking "OMG that's so expensive". I have found that it isn't. For the last few years I have been getting them from this place. So for ~$20 you can get a pound of beans. Of course, you can get a qt of extract for ~$50. So it might be a wash in the end, but for my money, nothing beats the look of those tiny little seeds of awesomeness in icing or cream brulee. And in my tiny little kitchen, where am I going to store a quart of vanilla? With the beans, I throw them in sugar and viola!, I end up with vanilla sugar